THEY LOOKED LIKE GOLD
March 12, 2008
© Fred Dumpling. Redistribution is prohibited.
In the stationery store, everything is colorful in its own way. Bright scrapbook paper sits alongside muted notebooks and black&white postcards, each coaxing in its particular language, "Pick me. Walk away with me. Take me home," and none really knowing what a "home" is. They sit proudly in their ignorance, eagerly displaying their hearts and their ovals, letting customers test their textures, and purring under their fingers.
The bell on the door jingles as another woman enters the store. She is old, her face wizened and her plump chin lifted; she is proud— proud like the antique journals that know they are worth their price.
The wares immediately make her their target. "Pick me," chirp the envelopes on the shelves, but she passes them by. "Pick me," coo the calligraphy pens, but they, too, are ignored. All around the store, "Pick me. Walk away with me. Take me home."
One small box is as eager as the rest, begging and whining and doing as all the bigger boxes do, but the woman takes it in her hand, and it becomes silent, and all around the store, the notebooks and the scrapbooks and the stickers and the stencils become silent. The young cashier shifts behind the counter and sniffs the air, as if detecting some unusual change in the atmosphere, but she shrugs her shoulders and returns to her work.
The woman lifts the box to eye level and turns it in her fingertips, admiring the intricate gold designs on the object. It isn't real gold, but what does that matter? It's beautiful nonetheless. She closes her eyes. Her lips turn slightly upward—
She remembers the dumplings from long ago. She was a little girl, then, with pigtails her younger brother liked to tug before running away and collapsing into giggles. It was Chinese New Year's Day, and her forearms were covered in flour.
"Mama," she called, holding her arms out in front of her so as not to soil her apron. The flour floated down to the carpet instead. "I'm done."
Mama smiled at her and led her back to the kitchen, where she taught the little girl how to stuff the flat circles of dough with just the right amount of beef before pinching the dumplings closed and wetting the seams to make them stick. ("Dumplings for prosperity," Mama said, "because they look like Chinese gold ingots.") Then Mama slid the dumplings into the oven as the girl washed the flour and beef juice off her hands and arms.
The dumplings were warm and brown that night, and the three of them ate heartily.
The old woman opens her eyes and stills the fingers that had been tracing the box's golden edges. She returns the box to its table and quickly exits the store.
The stationery are silent for the rest of the day.